BoK’s new board takes the wheel

KATHMANDU: After a little over two months, Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) today handed over the management of Bank of Kathmandu(BoK) to the bank’s new Board of Directors (BoD) led by its chairman Narendra Basnyat.The management committee appointed by NRB — led by coordinator Laxmi Prapanna Niroula and members Ramesh Kumar Pokharel, Prem Prasad Pandey and Murari Basnet — was mandated to hand over the management to the new BoK board after the bank’s special AGM yesterday.
BoK had yesterday elected four board directors from public shareholders — Govinda Prasad Sharma Regmi, Bishnu Kumar Banjade,Narendra Basnyat and Dr Hem Raj Subedi — and unnanimously selected three board directors Ramesh Nath Dhungel, Bijaya Krishna Shrestha and Satya Narayan Manandhar from among the promoters.
Aapart from the four public shareholders, a fifth — former director Balaram Neupane — had also filed his candidacy for board director as the majority of BoK’s shares is with the public. The promoters are only 42 per cent stakeholders.Earlier on May 19, NRB had taken over the bank’s management after suspending its board and sent a four-member team led by NRB executive director Niroula to oversee BoK’s running. This was after the BoK board’s controversial decision to ‘call back’Radhesh Pant from the post of managing director.
Meanwhile, Pant — former managing director of Bank of Kathmandu (BoK) — has joined Kumari Bank as its chief executive officer (CEO).